Printing & Imaging Blog

Partly as a way to stabilize hardware margins, Xerox boosted the base prices on these models while simultaneously setting the costs for associated color-ink consumables only about a third higher than for black cartridges. The move will allow end users to print color or black-and-white pages at nearly equivalent rates, the company says.

Solution providers may be able to reap four times more margin with this alternative approach since it relies less on slim hardware margins, according to Shell Haffner, worldwide solid-ink product manager for Xerox. The plan also addresses a growing market concern that consumables costs are too high and allows solution providers to sell total cost of ownership (TCO) versus scrambling to undercut a competitor's hardware prices, he adds.

“This approach is something a solution provider can have in the toolkit to convince customers that color can be a good deal,” says Haffner. “Some companies may be attracted by the lower hardware price, but they are paying for it in the supplies, and now they are actually starting to realize this.”

Haffner adds that over a four-year period, end users can save 50 percent when they factor in supplies and hardware for the Phaser devices. “With solid-ink products, resellers now can add their solutions on top of a great story about saving money, which gives them another benefit that they can portray to their customers,” says Haffner. “The raw printing costs are much lower, so that makes the solution that much better.”